IIAECKEL'S PHILOSOPHY. 415 



same is true of molecules or mass-particles, which consist of two or 

 more atoms.* But these elementary psychical activities which are 

 attributed to the atoms are unconscious processes. Consciousness and 

 soul-life are not identical terms ; consciousness forms but a part of soul- 

 phenomena; the largest part of the latter is unconscious, f There is no 

 immaterial substance; experience never reveals such a thing, no force 

 that is not bound to matter, no form of energy that is not mediated 

 by movements of matter. 



There is no difference between organic and inorganic nature. All 

 phenomena are explained by physico-chemical forces in each realm. 

 The doctrine of the vitalists is absurd. The peculiar chemical-physical 

 properties of carbon — particularly of the carbon compounds — are the 

 mechanical causes of the peculiar movements which distinguish the 

 organic from the inorganic world. Life, in other words, is the product 

 of inorganic nature, the living plasm originated from inorganic carbon 

 compounds, t The universe is a unity, all natural forces are one. All 

 the phenomena of organic life are subject to the universal law of sub- 

 stance, as much so as inorganic phenomena. 



The higher forms of life are developed from the lower in accordance 

 with the principles of the theory of evolution as advanced by Darwin. 

 That man is descended from the higher apes is now an absolutely 

 proved fact. The idea of purpose, the teleological explanation, which 

 was eliminated from physical science long ago, can not be accepted in 

 biology. The theory of natural selection proposed by Darwin explains 

 the origin of so-called purposive organisms by purely mechanical 

 causes. There is no purposive impulse discoverable anywhere in 

 organic life; everything is the necessary result of the struggle for 

 existence, which acts as a blind regulator and not as a foreseeing God, 

 and which causes the transformation of organic forms by the reciprocal 

 action of the laws of heredity and adaptation. Nor is there any such 

 purposiveness in our moral life or in history, individual or racial. 

 Mechanical causality explains everything. 



We turn now to Haeckel's philosophy of soul, to which he devotes 

 one third of the entire space of the ' Weltraethsel.' § The soul is a 

 natural phenomenon; hence psychology is a branch of natural science, 

 particularly of physiology. The so-called psychologists are ignorant of 

 anatomy and physiology, hence the largest part of psj'chological litera- 

 ture is to-day worthless waste paper. The prevalent conception of soul 

 life regards soul and bod)' as two different beings, says Haeckel, and 

 this view has nothing to stand on. Soul life is a sum total of vital 



* ' Weltraethsel,' p. 259. See also ' Monismus/ p. 14. 

 f ' Weltraethsel,' pp. 206f. 

 t ' Weltraethsel,' pp. 296ff. 

 § Pp. 101-243. 



